Consuming media presentations (e.g., audio and/or video presentations) generally involves listening to audio information and/or viewing video information. Media presentations may include, for example, radio programs, music, television programs, radio or television commercials, movies, still images, etc. Media-centric companies such as, for example, advertising companies, broadcast networks, media researchers, etc., are often interested in determining the viewing and/or listening interests of audience members to better market their products and/or to improve their programming. Ascertaining such viewing and/or listening habits often involves determining which media content was presented to the audience members.
Audience monitoring devices, such as site meters, tags, portable personal meters, etc., can be used to automatically determine which media content is being presented by a media device. Such monitoring devices are typically configured to monitor presentation of media content (e.g., from which viewing and/or listening activities can be inferred) by determining an identity, or certain attributes, of the media content being presented. For example, one technique of determining which media content is being presented to an audience member involves determining (e.g., generating) monitored signatures representative of the audio and/or video signals output by a monitored media presentation device (e.g., such as the output of one or more televisions, stereos, speakers, set top boxes, computers, video display devices, video games, mobile telephones, etc.) and comparing each determined monitored signature to one or more reference signatures corresponding to known (e.g., reference) media content. A successful match between a monitored signature and a reference signature indicates that the monitored media content may correspond to the particular reference media content represented by the matching reference signature. However, under some operating conditions, the monitored signature and the reference signature may not match even though the monitored media content corresponds to the particular reference media content represented by the unmatched reference signature.